This is misleading b/c i'm sure on some level what both these guys (Mario & Rick) said/saying is true. Smith probably told him "yeah we want you back, but we likely will not be able to afford what you may command on the market....hint, hint."

Of course Mario's agent was in his other ear saying " They always say that, it's just a negotiating tactic to give you less money. Why don't we test the market and see what houston comes back with....hint hint."

Of course, we know how those "tests" come out 9/10 times with high profile FA's. I have no doubt that mario may have wanted to stay here, I think his fiance is from here & he still owns a home here....but the temptation of 100 million is just too much for anyone to say no to.

Seeing now how dire our salary cap situation was/(is) -- that we had to let Winston & Brisiel go, and with Arian & Myers due and Duane Brown's contract and the cap ceiling holding for the next few years -- I can easily see where Smith would just let Mario walk. He wasn't part of "the core" group.

Seeing now how dire our salary cap situation was/(is) -- that we had to let Winston & Brisiel go, and with Arian & Myers due and Duane Brown's contract and the cap ceiling holding for the next few years -- I can easily see where Smith would just let Mario walk. He wasn't part of "the core" group.

Brown wasn't due up until after this year, so in theory they could've waited to sign him until after this season.

maybe letting go of those guys could've been an attempt by Smith to make room for mario....Mario just signed before smith had a looksee at the final numbers.

Brown wasn't due up until after this year, so in theory they could've waited to sign him until after this season.

maybe letting go of those guys could've been an attempt by Smith to make room for mario....Mario just signed before smith had a looksee at the final numbers.

Nah, Mario was the former #1 pick who performed way better--overall--than the number 2 and number 3 pick (which was a great thing for Mario the free agent, btw). No way did Rick Smith ever have any sort of illusions as to whether Mario could come back or not. Too many teams with too much spare money existed.

For Mario to continue to paint himself a victim is just sad. I'm not even mad about it anymore. I genuinely feel sorry for him because of how he genuinely thinks he got shown the door.

The Texans drafted the best player out of the three choices the Texans had eyed for the top pick. That's not Mario's fault, and it damn sure isn't the fault of our team either. They paid him well, but paid him less than what VY or RB would have wanted. Win-Win, IMO: Mario gets to be the #1 overall AND gets money he would have had at position number 4. Flash forward to this past offseason and it all worked out well for Mario.

Lost in all of this is whether or not the Texans "wanted" him back. To me, that's water under the bridge and isn't the main focus of this at all. What is to be focused upon is DID the Texans have the money to win him back? Nope. Therefore, this is not even an issue in the grand schemes of things.

All Mario had to do is be real and say "Hey, I enjoyed my time in Houston. I worked hard when I was there. I will work hard in Buffalo. God has blessed me with the ability to play football, and I am now playing for the Bills."

But no. Hell no. He had to set himself up nicely with a convenient alibi....my former team stabbed me in the back, discarded me, never even tried to keep me. Makes for good TV drama. Makes good deflection and flares to ward off the missiles of criticism when the long knives come out for Mario when he doesn't produce in Buffalo. He's more worried about us than he is about him playing well in Buffalo. He could have painted a better picture of himself, of us, and of this game itself. But he chose to get offended and STILL chooses to be a child about being the richest freaking defensive player in history. If that doesn't turn fans sour, nothing will.

Jacoby should not have been boo's. Mario? If the mob wants to stick up a thumbs down into the air, let the mob have their way. Mario asked for it.

Nah, Mario was the former #1 pick who performed way better--overall--than the number 2 and number 3 pick (which was a great thing for Mario the free agent, btw). No way did Rick Smith ever have any sort of illusions as to whether Mario could come back or not. Too many teams with too much spare money existed.

For Mario to continue to paint himself a victim is just sad. I'm not even mad about it anymore. I genuinely feel sorry for him because of how he genuinely thinks he got shown the door.

The Texans drafted the best player out of the three choices the Texans had eyed for the top pick. That's not Mario's fault, and it damn sure isn't the fault of our team either. They paid him well, but paid him less than what VY or RB would have wanted. Win-Win, IMO: Mario gets to be the #1 overall AND gets money he would have had at position number 4. Flash forward to this past offseason and it all worked out well for Mario.

Lost in all of this is whether or not the Texans "wanted" him back. To me, that's water under the bridge and isn't the main focus of this at all. What is to be focused upon is DID the Texans have the money to win him back? Nope. Therefore, this is not even an issue in the grand schemes of things.

All Mario had to do is be real and say "Hey, I enjoyed my time in Houston. I worked hard when I was there. I will work hard in Buffalo. God has blessed me with the ability to play football, and I am now playing for the Bills."

But no. Hell no. He had to set himself up nicely with a convenient alibi....my former team stabbed me in the back, discarded me, never even tried to keep me. Makes for good TV drama. Makes good deflection and flares to ward off the missiles of criticism when the long knives come out for Mario when he doesn't produce in Buffalo. He's more worried about us than he is about him playing well in Buffalo. He could have painted a better picture of himself, of us, and of this game itself. But he chose to get offended and STILL chooses to be a child about being the richest freaking defensive player in history. If that doesn't turn fans sour, nothing will.

Jacoby should not have been boo's. Mario? If the mob wants to stick up a thumbs down into the air, let the mob have their way. Mario asked for it.

Nah, Mario was the former #1 pick who performed way better--overall--than the number 2 and number 3 pick (which was a great thing for Mario the free agent, btw). No way did Rick Smith ever have any sort of illusions as to whether Mario could come back or not. Too many teams with too much spare money existed.

For Mario to continue to paint himself a victim is just sad. I'm not even mad about it anymore. I genuinely feel sorry for him because of how he genuinely thinks he got shown the door.

The Texans drafted the best player out of the three choices the Texans had eyed for the top pick. That's not Mario's fault, and it damn sure isn't the fault of our team either. They paid him well, but paid him less than what VY or RB would have wanted. Win-Win, IMO: Mario gets to be the #1 overall AND gets money he would have had at position number 4. Flash forward to this past offseason and it all worked out well for Mario.

Lost in all of this is whether or not the Texans "wanted" him back. To me, that's water under the bridge and isn't the main focus of this at all. What is to be focused upon is DID the Texans have the money to win him back? Nope. Therefore, this is not even an issue in the grand schemes of things.

All Mario had to do is be real and say "Hey, I enjoyed my time in Houston. I worked hard when I was there. I will work hard in Buffalo. God has blessed me with the ability to play football, and I am now playing for the Bills."
But no. Hell no. He had to set himself up nicely with a convenient alibi..

..my former team stabbed me in the back, discarded me, never even tried to keep me. Makes for good TV drama. Makes good deflection and flares to ward off the missiles of criticism when the long knives come out for Mario when he doesn't produce in Buffalo. He's more worried about us than he is about him playing well in Buffalo. He could have painted a better picture of himself, of us, and of this game itself. But he chose to get offended and STILL chooses to be a child about being the richest freaking defensive player in history. If that doesn't turn fans sour, nothing will.

Jacoby should not have been boo's. Mario? If the mob wants to stick up a thumbs down into the air, let the mob have their way. Mario asked for it.

Lol, you say you're not mad anymore....but then you type out this long post that's laden with nothing but feelings and obvious ill will toward the guy.........still.

How is whether or not the texans wanted him back not the main focus? Especially in context of what he said & when the majority of the idiots booing the guy in the stadium this sunday will be booing him b/c they feel like he sold us out to take more money. They damn sure couldn't boo the guy for anything else .........not without looking like hypocrites anyway.

Also, what does anything that happened here with him have to do with how Buffalo fans feel about him now?

You're also a fool if you don't think that Rick Smith & Bob didn't want him back. Sure, we were up against it, but if the price was right or at least reasonable, they surely would've been open to resigning him.

Don't be a fool & think that Ricky & co. don't play the media too...There's at least 1 other instance where this may or may not have occured. Upon Dunta leaving he alledges that Smith told him 1 thing but said/did another. All Mario's saying here is that "it's not all on me folks". Now surely, i'm not mad that Smith isn't afraid to go back on his word........as long as the teams best interests are at heart, but surely it's not out of the realm of possibility that publically Smith/Mcnair are saying they want him back & privately their actions are reflecting something else.

This is misleading b/c i'm sure on some level what both these guys (Mario & Rick) said/saying is true. Smith probably told him "yeah we want you back, but we likely will not be able to afford what you may command on the market....hint, hint."

Of course Mario's agent was in his other ear saying " They always say that, it's just a negotiating tactic to give you less money. Why don't we test the market and see what houston comes back with....hint hint."

Of course, we know how those "tests" come out 9/10 times with high profile FA's. I have no doubt that mario may have wanted to stay here, I think his fiance is from here & he still owns a home here....but the temptation of 100 million is just too much for anyone to say no to.

MW is pissing me off a little with his comments from that article.

Just because Rick Smith didn't want to give Mario $5 million per sack doesn't mean you he was forced in to Free Agency.....

I wish him the best but he shouldn't act like he took the Bills offer because he liked the city. It was all about money.

..
Buffalo Bills defensive end Mario Williams returns to Houston on Sunday to face the Texans butsays he never wanted to go elsewhere.

Williams, the No. 1 pick in the NFL draft by the Texans in 2006, accepted a six-year, $100 million contract offer from the Bills during the offseason when he became a free agent. The Texans refused to use a franchise tag that would have cost them $20 million for one season to keep him.

"I didn't want to enter free agency in the first place, but it was a one-way door given to me to leave Houston," Williams told KRIV-TV. "I want the fans there to know entering free agency was not my decision."

Williams hasn't performed up to expectations so far this season for the Bills (3-4). He has 3 1/2 sacks in seven games.

The Texans are 6-1 without Williams.

"I'm definitely excited about coming back to the place where it all began," said Williams, who has 56 1/2 career sacks. "The way things ended, I definitely feel like it was kind of a rough and all-of-the-sudden goodbye. There's some things that I'm definitely uneasy about, the final decision-making that happened there. It was just the way it was handled.".
..

I would love to know what the Texans offer to MW was. Mario signed a huge deal in Buffalo, it appears he went strictly for money, it wasn't for the winning program they have there.

The Texans were never going to give him that kind of money nor should they. Hell he probably wasn't even worth the money the Texans offered him, if they did.

He insinuated several times over the summer that the Texans didn't make an offer. I can see that given the cap situation they were in. There was no way they could afford him even for half what the Bills paid him and still sign Foster, Brown, and Schaub.

He's not worth what he's getting paid currently but he is an upgrade over what we have. We did not get better by letting Mario walk, but that's part of being a good team. You will run into the situation where you have to let good players walk and hope you have replacements that will grow into the role.

__________________
What did the city of Houston do to anger the football gods?

Two people have direct knowledge of that. One says he didn't get an offer, the other has no comment. I believe Mario.

That's not entirely true. Remember that there's an agent in between all this and it's the agent that talks to Rick Smith, not Mario.

As I posted in another thread, what probably happened was that Rick Smith and Mario's Agent talked just to get a feel for what each side thought it could do and after hearing what Mario was expecting, Rick told him he couldn't do anything close to that.

MW obviously care about what we, the fans, think of him. Well, heres what I think of him:

Mario did the things we wanted him to do in Houston.
He changed a few games with his skills
He was better than either Reggie Bush or VY

I don't hate the guy. I was happy to cheer for him (and even bought his jersey) when he played for us. I'm not going to hate him just because he left, I just won't cheer for him anymore. I don't care the reason, either. He's not a Texan. Thats the end of it

As explained earlier today during the latest Pro Football Talk on NBC Sports Network, thatís true. The Texans indeed forced Williams to become a free agent. Because, per a source with knowledge of the dynamics in Houston, G.M. Rick Smith decided the team could win without him.
...
Given Williamsí performance in Buffalo and the Texansí performance without him, Smithís decision puts him in line for the Executive of the Year award.

Lol, you say you're not mad anymore....but then you type out this long post that's laden with nothing but feelings and obvious ill will toward the guy.........still.

How is whether or not the texans wanted him back not the main focus? Especially in context of what he said & when the majority of the idiots booing the guy in the stadium this sunday will be booing him b/c they feel like he sold us out to take more money. They damn sure couldn't boo the guy for anything else .........not without looking like hypocrites anyway.

Also, what does anything that happened here with him have to do with how Buffalo fans feel about him now?

You're also a fool if you don't think that Rick Smith & Bob didn't want him back. Sure, we were up against it, but if the price was right or at least reasonable, they surely would've been open to resigning him.

Don't be a fool & think that Ricky & co. don't play the media too...There's at least 1 other instance where this may or may not have occured. Upon Dunta leaving he alledges that Smith told him 1 thing but said/did another. All Mario's saying here is that "it's not all on me folks". Now surely, i'm not mad that Smith isn't afraid to go back on his word........as long as the teams best interests are at heart, but surely it's not out of the realm of possibility that publically Smith/Mcnair are saying they want him back & privately their actions are reflecting something else.

A guy can't say it's not all on him if he left for wayyyyyy more than what the current team could offer him. It's pretentious to think otherwise.

Any offer south of $90 million was going to be a slap to his face when the Bills are sitting there with $100 mill.

What's being lost in all of this is that there exists 31 other teams who at any time can pay any other team's player MORE than what he'd get with his current team...it's the whole point of free agency: To let players decide their destinies and get maybe more money than they would if there wasn't free agency.

For a player to ***** about how the process--a process that makes them TONS of extra money--forced a team's hand, and how that looks "bad" in some people's eyes is total bull****. Just leave, go get your big bank, and be done with it. It's not the current team's fault.